Automobile torpedo.



PATENTED; JUNE 25, 1907. G. c. DAVISON. v AUTOMOBILE TORPEDO. APPLICATION FILED 00119. 1906.

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PATENTED JUNE 25, 1907,

No. 858,i266.

K G. e. DAVISON. AUTOMOBILE TORPEDO APPLICATION TILED OUT-19, 1906.

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Wane/3% I PATENTED JUNE 25, 1907v G. '0. DAVISON. AUTOMOBILE TORPEDO.

APPLICATION FILED 0075.19, 1906.

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PAT-EDITED JUNE 25,1907.

G. 0. DAVISON.

AUTOMOBILE TORPEDO.

APPLICATION FILED 00119, 1906.

6 SHEETBSHEET 5.

' reducing shownfin 4 ,ablejor application to turbine torpedoes as GREGORY O. DAVISON, OF THE UNITED STATES NAVY.

AUTOMOBILE TORPEDO. 4

Specification of Letters Ifatent.

Patented June 25, 1907.

Application filed October 19,1906. Serial No. 339,710.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, GREGORY C. DAVISON, lieutenant commander, United States Navy, and a citizen of the United States, residing at Newport, in the county of Newport and State of Rhode Island, have invented certain new and useful Improvements inAutomobile Torpedoes; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, and exact de- 'scription of the invention, such as v. ill enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.

"My invention relates to methods of and means for compensating torpedoes driven by turbines, or other forms of rotary engines or rotary devices, against errors in direction occasioned by tating parts.

In a turbine driven automobile torpedo, as at present constructed, there are one or more (generally two) rotating turbine wheels and gear connecting more I generally two) propellers. These turbine wheels rotate at a very high-speed and frequently in the same direction, 'nd with the reduction gearing, the prope er shaft, and other parts drive constitute in efl ect a series of fly wheels at varying speeds rotating about the same axis,-

with the sum of the moments of inertia of 'the various arts in one direction largely in excess of the moment of inertia of the one proeller, which rotates in the reverse direction.

ince the mass of the torpedo after being discharged is held temporarily in a freely yielding mediinn, the air, and is afterward borne in another yielding medium, the water, the effect of this rotating mass from the interior of the torpedo is to cause the torpedo, as a whole, to act as a gyroscope, and in so acting certain deflecting forces are set up, which, up .to the present time, have not been properly compensated for, especially 'with turbine driven torpedoes i In the well known Howell torpedo, which was driven by a rotating fly wheel, set transversely of the torpedo, and which tor edo is described in the Howell Patent, 0. 311,325, granted January 27, 1885, this gyroscopic action of the torpedo, as a whole, was recognized, and was used to steer the torpedo on a straight course; but the apparatus described in that patent, and

' the Howell torpedo, was-not suitnew constru'cted, and the attempt has been the gyroscopic action of the ro- I the axis of Z. Now, as stated in the Howell same to one or n by the turbines,

made to rectify such errors by the use'of lead ballast, which reduced the can ying capacity of the torpedo, and was otherwise objectionable.

. Before attempting to describe the method or means for correct the error, it might be Well to explain brie y the 'gyroscopic action of a fly wheel, which is rotated in bearings fixed in the shell of the torpedo. As is well known to scientists, if a fly wheel, free to move about the axes of X, Y, and Z, is rotating' about any one of these, say the axis of X, and a force is applied, not arallel to the axis of X, tending to deflect t e axis of the fly wheel, say in the direction of the axis of Y, then the axis of the fly wheel will not apparently yield to this force, but will tilt about patent aforesaid: If the fly wheel revolve about a horizontal axis, and an extraneous -force"act against the torpedo, so as to tend to turn 1t about a vertical axis, then the resulting motion of the fly wheel, (supposing the torpedo to yield) will not be about the vertical axis, but about a horizontal axis perendicular to the plane of the other two axes. n other words, if the shaft of the rotating fly wheel is horizontal and transverse to the torpedo, any lateral deflecting force applied to the torpedo will tend to cause the tor edo to roll about a longitudinal axis; while, the axis of the revolving aft in the torpedo and horizontal, any lateral deflecting force applied to the torpedo will tend to cause the torpedo to rise or dive, according to the direction of the force, and the direction of rotation of the fly wheel. Again, if the fly wheel axis be transverse of the torpedo and vertical, any deflecting force tending to tilt the nose of the torpedo in the vertical plane will cause the torpedo to swerve or shear to the right or left, according to the direction of rotation of the fly wheel. In

a deflective force would cause application of deviations, which can be readintermediate ily followed rules just stated.

Reverting to the turbine it will be noted that when the torpedo is in the air, after having been released from the torpedo tube, the shell will be free to rotate, and there will be a rapidly rotating mass comprising the turbine wheels and connections mounted in fly wheels be fore and out by applying the general driven torpedo, I

and before it strikes the water,

IIO'

the shell of the torpedo, all or nearly all rotating in onedirection, and reaction due to the escapin gases and other causes will cause the shel of the torpedo to rotate in the opposite direction; but since the mass of the shell of the torpedo, with the parts rigidly at tached thereto, far exceeds that of the turbine wheels, and the other rotating parts, the an lar motion of the shell of the torpedo wi be very small in spite of the fact that the angular velocity of the rotating parts is very high; but in ractice it has been found that the to edo s loll often rolls, while in the air, throng about 45 degrees When fired from the broad side of an ordinary tor edo boat destroyer. As soon as the torpe o strikes the Water, if the nose strikes a wave, or ii the nose strikes before the tail, if theplat form from which the torpedo has been orgy is measured by firin is moving rapidly, there will be a deflective force a plied to the torpedo, the resultant of whic will be in another direction, as already explained. Again, whep the propellers, which are rapidly rotating in the air,

Strike the Water, they will act like a sudden brake applied to the driven shafts, and this braking effect will be greatly magnified when it reaches the turbine wheels. Thus if the propellers rotate with one-seventh of the angular velocity of the turbine Wheels, the slowing down of ten revolutions on the proellers would mean revolutions on the turbine Wheels, and although the mass of these Wheels may be small, the kinetic enthe mass multiplied by the square of the velocity or This sud den slowing down of the turbine wheels will react on the shell of the torpedo, causing disturbing factors to enter the calculated path of the torpedo.

The rising or the diving of the torpedo can be taken care of Within bounds by the immersion apparatus, but the lateral deflection and the rolling of the torpedo about its longitudinal axis are serious objections to tur bine driven to edocs, as hitherto-developed. The lateral do ection, which may or maynot be wholl or partly oocasioned by the roll,

frequent y causes an initial Shem; which causes the torpedo to travel at an angle let-- orally with the calculated ath before the automatic steering gear ta res charge an brings the torpedo back, not to the'ltrue path, but to a path parallel to the true path. '1 is angular deflection often causes the torpedo to miss the target altogether. The .roll 0 the torpedo is objectionable from various standpoints;'first, and probably-most important, it

interferes with the proper relative action of the horizontal and the vertical steering rudders. For instance, if the torpedo rolls throu h degrees, while in the air, the horizontl steering rudders would then be vertical, the vertical steering form of driving apparatus (JOIdlHg to my invention; Fig.

rudders horiiurther described.

assess zontal, and the resulting efiect "would be Wholly objectionable. If the roll is less-than 90 degrees, the objection would remain, but in a loss degree. Again,

cient, it would obviously interfere with the pendulum ordinarily used in connection with the gfloscope, and it might empty or put out air fed to the alcohol lamp for heating up the the turbine There are various other olr eek-ions, which need not be further mentioned, as the remedy proposed is intended to, ablegyroscopio effects My invention consists in substance in so V i that substantially arranging the apparatus, perfect dynamic stability is secured.

other words, I provide a system built up of a series of oppositely moving parts used driving the torpedo, so arranged that the sum of the moments of inertia stall the parts,

rotating in one direction shell balance t moments of inertia of all of the partsrotating in the opposite direction This is' accomplished by the apparatus shown in the acooinpanying drawings in whichlih' ,saml

arts are indicated by 4 throughout the several views;

Figure 1 shows a side elevation of a torpedowith the driving gear constructed according,

to my invention, the driving apparatus being shown in dotted lines; Fig. 2 lsa snnll view showing 3 is a verti longitudinal section through thetail of. on torpedo, shown in Fig. l a larger scale and parts being Fig. at shows a section along the line 4-4 Fig. 3, audlooiring in the direction of the arrou's; Fig. 5 shows a section along 5- 5 of Fig. ihand looking in the direction of the arrows; Fig. 6 showsdiagramrnatialy if the roll is suflie the same letterl' diagrammatically another constriwt-ed oothe line and does, provide for all of the objectionhereinbefore set out.

1 with parts being on Q I broken awayz '1 the double stage turbine indicated-1n Fig. 3;

Fig. 7 shows a section similar to that 1ndi-- Y no cat-ed in Fig. 3, and illustrates a modification of the driving apparatus, including the timblues and reducinggear; Fig. 8 is a diagram showing the double stage turbines u in Fig. 7; Fig?) is aowilegv f h s ows snot 101' In cation 0 t 'e arming turbine heels; and 'gQlO isn diagram 1!! similar to Fig. 7, b g. r 1 5 merit for driving th ropeller shaft f oerspective showing-the gearing illustrated in A, Figs. 1 to5,

pedo carrying the'air flask and pro shows the shell of the with various transverse bearings A A it III" gearings, which will be hereinafter descnboll. V

0 represents vertical rudders or 'steo rudders, and D rciresents the'web in I the horizontal or (living rudders are mounted. The control oi the v0 and horizontal rudders does not part of my present invention,'and will mt \IO (not alloy). constitute L ,E E, see Figs. 1 and 3, are two propellers mounted to rotate in reverse a common axis.

E E shown in Fig. 2, are two propellers mounted'to rotate in oppositedirections about diflerentaxes. 4

.Since Fig.- 2-shows the apparatus in its simplest formy'it will be first described. In this figui p, F? F, are two turbine wheels, which may be single stage or multiple stage directions about ,.as desired, which are mounted respectively on the shafts y 1/, each shaft carry ng a pinion a: m, which pinions are connected by the gears w The turbinesF F are caused to rotate in reverse directions, and these gears 92 x will cause the propellers E E to rotate at precisely the same speed, but in reverse directions, so that if the mass and dimen sions o the rotating parts are the same, the

moments of inertia in oppositedirections will balance each other ahd dynamic stability will be secured.

1 It will be obvious that the pinions w as might meshv directly with each other, thus avoiding the necessity for the idlers x 02 but these are inserted for convenience of arrangemeint in the limited space inside of the tore o. p While the arrangement shown in Fig. 2 illustrates the o eration of the device in the simplest form, prefer one of the arrangements shown in the other fures, preferably,

that shown in Figs. 1 to 6, which will now be described. These figures show the preferred form of apparatus, in which the turbines F, F are provided with expanding vanesf and f receiving air from nozzles g mounted in the partition plate G. The turbine F is provided with a sleeve F which, for convenience of sha t is expanded to form the hollow 6o manufacture, is splined to the turbine wheel as atf, but which may be made integral with said turbine wheel, if desired. This sleeve F? rotates on the fixed shaft H and carries a pinion I. The other turbine wheel F has a sleeve F which rotates on the inner sleeve F", being separated therefrom by ball bearingsf This outer sleeve F carries a pinion I, which meshes in the pinions K on the two shafts K, These pinions K are each integral with or secured to a sleeve K, which sleeve carries a pinion K. This pinion K meshes with an idler L, see Fig. 4, which in turn meshes with the pinion I fast to the sleeve F Each of the sleeves K also carries a pinion K which meshes with the s ur Wheel M fast on the hollow shaft M, whic is connected in any suitable way, as by the cou ling m to the hollow shaft M This propeller shaft M", and this hollow shaft is provided with escape passages m for the air escaping from the turbines, and with a valve 1 seat m for the tail valve N, which is secured to a support n. I do not claim any specific peller shaft M known in the art. In rear of the hollow pr'o-v there is an opening in the tail of the torpedo, as at A". One of the ropellers E is secured to this propeller s aft M and the other propeller E is mounted on a hollow shaft P concentric with the shaft M and provided with a bevel gear P, which meshes with the bevel wheels 0, which in turn mesh with the bevel pinion M on the shaft M in one direction will cause the shafts M and P, and thepro ellers carried thereby, to rotate in reverse irections.

It will be noted that I provide duplicate sets of gear wheels K, K, and duplicate bevel gears O, etc.,'s0 that of a common axis, and since these wheels '10- tate in reverse directions their moments of inertia will neutralize each other.

It will be noted that the spur wheel M, shafts M, M and M and the ropeller E all rotate in one direction, and tl iere is nothing to counterbalance this but the propeller E and the hollow shaft P, which rotate in opbut the moments of inertia of these two groups of parts may be equalized by making the propeller head E or the hollow shaft 1? considerably heavier than the structural strength would demand, so that the sum of the moments of inertia ma be made zero. The requisite proportion o the parts may be readily determined by either calculation or experiment. I

In the form of device shown in Figs. 7 and 8, the two turbine wheels F and F are se arated by acasting G having nozzles g. is

casting is annular in shape, and journaled on bevel gears K meshthe thein'terior thereof are ing in bevel teeth F and F carried by wheels F and F respectively. The wheel F carries the sleeve carrying a pinion F meshing with the gear wheels K*,on the shafts These gear wheels K drive pinions K meshing with the spur wheel M secured to the shaft M, driving the propellers, as already described with reference to Fig. 3.

In the form of device shown in Figs. 9 and 10, the nozzles and turbine wheels are arranged substantially as shown in Fig. 3, but the sleeve F ings A made fast to the shell of the tor edo. These bevel gears K mesh with the evel teeth F on the turbine wheel F. The sleeve F also carries a pinion F meshing with the gear wheels K journaled on the fixed shafts K". These gear wheels K drive inions K meshing with the spur wheel M ast on the shaft M which drives the propellers, as already describedwith rgference to Fig. 3. i It will be seen that, in all of the modifications illustrated in Figs. 3 to 10 the two turbine wheels rotate in opposite directions and are geared together so that they must rotate Thus the rotation of the shaft M the rotating parts may 'be symmetrically'disposed on oppositesides III 0 r 1 5 carries a bevel gear F", which meshes with bevel gears K journaled in bearat precisely equal speeds. in the same ay the other gear wheels, synnnctrioall gr dis- )osed on either side oi the axis of the propeller shaft, are so geared that pairs of each will revolve at equal speeds, but the two incinbers of each pa ir in opposite directions. New by equalizing the weights of: pairs of Wheels revolving at equal speeds in'reversc diree 'tions, the sum 0" the moments of inertia of each pair will become zero. the ease of the two turbine wheels, one is slightly larger than the other, the wei hts may he so arranged that the moments o i inertia of each shall be the same, and since the two wheels rovovle in opposite directions the sum of these nunnmits will become zero. Thus it will be seen that by any of the hereindescribed arrangement substantially perfect dynamic stability secured, and all gy roscopic oiloet due to the rotation of the parts Within the torpedo is entirely OlW'lz'tlIGfl It will be obvious that various modilica tions might be made in the herein described apparatus, which. could be used without departing from the spirit of my invention Having thus described my invention, what I claim and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States, is:--

1. The method of compensating torpedoes driven by turbines or other forms of rotary engines or rotary derives, against errors in direction oee: med by gyroscopic action of the rotating; parts, which consists in so arranging the rotating parts as to cause the moments of inertia in one direction to neutralize the mom cuts of inertia in the opposite direction so that the sum of the moments of inertia oi the system shall be zero, substanti a] ly a s rhrscrihcd r 2. The method of compensating torpedoes driven by turbines or other forms of rotary engines or rotary devices, against errors in direction occasioned by gyroscopie action of the rotating parts, which. consists in mounting the rotating parts synnmiitrically in pairs about a common axis, in driving the two members of each pair of parts in reverse directions at equal speeds and in proportioning Where, as in stance the weights and dimensions of these parts so that the sum of the moments of inertia in one direction may neutralize the sum of the mo ments of inertia in the reverse direction eaus ing a resultant dynamic stability, substantially as describe i v In an. automobile torpcdo,the combination with two driving Wheels rotating in 01) poeitc directions at equal s beds and having the same moments of inertia, of balanced reduction gearing driven by said'wheels in ogposite directions and having thesurn of t e moments of inertia zero, and a pair ,of propellers driven by said reduction caring in reverse directions and with e ua angular velocity, substantially asdesc'ri ed.

4. In a submarine torpedo, the combination with a double staged turbine engine havin g turbine wheels of equal moments of inertia revolving in opposite directions and at equal angular velocities, of a double system ol: reduction gearing driven by said Wheels, the sum of the moments of inertia of said system being zero, and propellers driven in reverse directions and at equal speeds by said reduction gearing, substantially as described.

5. In an automobile torpedo, the combination with two driving Wheels rotating in' opposite the same moments of inertia, of balanced reduction gearing driven by said wheels in 0 positodirections and having the sum of t e moments of inertia zero, and a pair of propellers driven by said reduction gearing in reverse directions and with equal angular velocity, with the weights of the propellers and pro eller shafts and other parts driven by said reduction gearing so arranged as to cause the sum of the moments of inertia of the same to become zero, substantially as described.

In testimony whereof, I ailix my signature, in presence of two witnesses.

GREGORY C. DAVISON.

Witnesses:

A. L. House, iVlAltTHA (l. Booms.

directions at equal speeds and having 

